President of the Nigeria Wrestling Federation Dr Daniel Igali, has lauded Team Nigeria at the recently concluded African Wrestling Championships in Port Harcourt Sunday after they finished tops at the championships.

Team Nigeria emerged winners of the Men’s Senior and the Women Freestyle wrestling with nine medals – amassing 4gold, 4silver and 1 bronze medal, while the Women also won nine out of the 10 gold medals and a silver to maintain their leadership position in the continental wrestling.

An overjoyed Igali said: “It was a wonderful feat from the Team of Nigerian wrestlers, I give kudos to them all. Everything about the hosting of the AWC was splendid, talking about the wrestlers, fans and supporters, the organisation was almost flawless,” said Igali, a Sydney 2000 Olympics gold medallist

“The sponsorship was amazing and most importantly, Team Nigeria wrestled like they never wrestled before and I’m so happy about that”.

The NWF president said that having hosted successfully and won the AWC, the next step for The Team Nigeria is to win medals at the Olympics, Vanguard writes.

“In two years we are going to win medals at the Olympics and also our next goal in the next two months at the Commonwealth Games is to do better than we have done at the African Championships.

“We have been preparing and training ahead of it. And for the Cadet and junior teams, that is the whole essence of this championship for them to get use to international tournaments, the focus of the Nigeria Wrestling Federation is not about if they win, but getting the experience and when they get used to international competitions in a few years time, when they are between 21 and 22 years we shall start expecting results from them.”